Summer.
June, July, and August.
For many years as a young mom, I had off during the summer. Oh what fun we had sleeping in, snuggled up in the bed eating breakfast, and watching Dragon Tales and Sesame Street. We would plan adventures to the park, attend Vacation Bible School, and go to the beach as a family. One summer we decided to go to an apple orchard and stay in the old country home for the week. We could pick as many apples as we wanted. Life has changed so much since those days. The usual and the unusual have happened. Children grow up, loved ones are living in heaven now, and the world has changed. Travelling is more complicated. Humans are more complicated.
It’s just something about summer.
I woke last night to the sound of thunder
How far off, I sat and wondered
Started hummin’ a song from 1962
Ain’t it funny how the night moves?
When you just don’t seem to have as much to lose
Strange how the night moves
With autumn closin’ in
Night moves (Bob Segar)
School’s out and the nights roll in
Man, just like a long lost friend
You ain’t seen in a while
And can’t help but smile
And it’s two bare feet on the dashboard
Young love and an old Ford
Cheap shades and a tattoo
And a Yoo-Hoo bottle on the floorboard (Kenny Chesney)
A friend of mine shares podcasts with me. The ones she knows I’ll like.
I listened to this poem or reflection about summer that she shared over text, and the writer seemed to capture my mind and emotions. The writer is Emily Freeman. The podcast is number 186. It felt so good to hear a universal acknowledgement of how summer may be experienced. As I began to receive emails from my daughter’s school and back to school shopping, I had mixed emotions. This reflection helped me push ahead to the inevitable. I’ve never been one for goodbyes. I spend too much time wondering if I did “it” well. Whatever “it” is. She gives grace and space for this, too. Thank you Emily. I’ve listened several times to the reflection just to ponder and pray.
God gave me a few verses in my reading of The Helper by Catherine Marshall. A book given to my mother in 1980 from Jessica my niece. I love running my fingers over all the books on the shelf to find something old that brings new expressions in my life.
“He is eager to answer us. And it shall be that before they call I will answer, and while they are yet speaking I will hear. Isaiah 65:24
He is out ahead opening the way.
“Listen carefully, I am about to do a new thing,
Now it will spring forth;
Will you not be aware of it?
I will even put a road in the wilderness,
Rivers in the desert.” Isaiah 43:19
Before I call or speak He hears and provides. Oh, Lord, do a new thing this year! Bring your living water in this wilderness!
ARRESTED BY GRACE 